1. Field of the Invention
This disclosure pertains to railway hopper cars and in particular to an implement used to evenly distribute granular material within the hoppers to reduce the valley angle of carried material and thus increase the capacity of each hopper.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Prior art devices which have sought to reduce valley angles and increase volumetric capacity have generally been directed to eliminating individual hatch openings and replacing each with so-called trough hatch openings which permit continuous feeding of the hopper and also reduce the valley angle of transported material. In the Prior Art there has been no known successful stationary device directed to reducing the valley angle and increasing hopper capacity for conventional round hatch openings. Slinging type devices that are mechanically driven are available for this purpose. These however are subject to frequent maintainence and are very expensive.